


Five Times Sherlock Loved Dancing and One Time He Didn't

by TheSmellOfDustAfterRain



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Dancing, Dancing Lessons, F/M, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Past Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-08
Updated: 2014-11-08
Packaged: 2018-02-24 15:05:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2585813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSmellOfDustAfterRain/pseuds/TheSmellOfDustAfterRain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I love dancing. I've always loved it."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Times Sherlock Loved Dancing and One Time He Didn't

+1

When Mummy was a girl her mother encouraged her to take ballet and, to this day, she will swear that that alone has led to her success in life.

So when each of her boys were old enough, they too were enrolled in ballet lessons. Mycroft hated it, having started his love affair with sweets early. Sherlock, on the other hand, loved it. Even as a child Sherlock’s mind was light years ahead of his peers, and he found that focusing on dance steps and routines narrowed his thoughts and quieted the storm in his head.  

Being the only boy in his class he disliked the giggles from the girls, but learned to ignore them when the music started up and he could fall out of his mind and into his body. At his first recital at age seven the little girls stumbled through the steps while Sherlock shone like a star.

After that, the teasing giggles stopped and were replaced with hushed whispers from the instructors at the innate gift he seemed to have.

 

+2                                                                         

At ten years old, Sherlock saw The Nutcracker and fell in love with the Prince.

Seven years later he and Victor Trevor, a graceful dancer Sherlock admired, auditioned to dance the role. Both boys were top of their class, both boys desperately wanted it, and both boys would do anything to get it. But, it turned out that the one thing that Victor wanted more than the role of the Prince was Sherlock himself, a fact the young detective easily preyed upon.

Between school lessons that bored the juvenile genius and waltzing into crimes scenes which sparked him, Sherlock excelled in dance and breezed through the audition. A few well worded remarks Victor’s direction guaranteed that the role went to Sherlock.

Victor was resentful and Sherlock was breathtaking in the spotlight.

 

+3

It took four years, two syringes, and a night of music less dancing for Victor to forgive Sherlock.

After the Nutcracker incident the two fell away from the world of dance. Victor followed his father into finance and Sherlock tried easing his boredom with chemistry, physics, forensics, and any other subject that claimed to be a challenge.

The two dancers reconnected in University three years after Sherlock stole the lead role from Victor, and for a year he attempted to torment the thief. Trevor’s infatuation and Sherlock’s boredom remained, though, and a year later the two fell into cocaine and each other’s arms.

On a quiet night, while the drugs sang in their veins, Victor wrapped his arms around Sherlock’s waist and whispered his forgiveness to the sound of silent dancing.

 

+4

Sherlock will say that the overdose was an accident but those who know him, meaning Mycroft, know that is a lie.

A year of being clean, after Lestrade’s ultimatum of sober up or never be allowed on the other side of the police tape, and weeks of no interesting cases had Sherlock’s mind was running at a mile a minute. If a particularly nasty string of murders hadn’t cropped up that required the consulting detective’s assistance, the Inspector may not have come round and found Sherlock motionless on the floor of his Montague flat.

In hospital, he claimed that he knew exactly how much he had taken and he was never in any danger. Mycroft would also say that his younger brother knew precisely how much to take to end the raging storm in his head.

Because on the floor of that shoddy flat, in the seconds before he lost consciousness, Sherlock felt like he was dancing.

 

-1

The curtains are drawn in 221B and Sherlock is moving John’s hand back to his hip for the third time.

“Just relax and imagine I’m Mary,” the detective says. “Bit hard with you being twenty centimetres taller than Mary,” John scoffs as they continue to haltingly dance around the flat.

Sherlock has dreamt of this moment several times over the years but always with John thinking only of him. To be a stand-in for the woman John was to marry was heartbreaking and almost made Sherlock reminiscent of the sting of the needle.

“You’d be a decent dancer, John, if you’d just relax,” Sherlock sighs, imagining he was practicing for the day he would marry John and not Mary.

 

+5

Two years after the business of assassins and Moriarty, Sherlock moves John’s hand back to his hip.

“You’re still too tense,” he whispers in the shorter man’s ear, as they float across the dance floor. “And you’re still too bloody tall,” John replies with a sparkle in his eye.

A wide grin appears on Sherlock’s face as he gazes down at his husband’s. “You weren’t complaining about my height when I had you pressed to the wall the other day,” the detective purred, slyly. John blushed and reached up to press his lips to Sherlock’s.

Later, when asked how long he has thought about this night, Sherlock will think back to that dance floor and respond, “Longer than you can imagine.”


End file.
